Blog

In April, the Wicked Local Media Solutions blog looked for ways to help your business connect with consumers by suggesting ideas for content, merchandise, and digital advertising strategy. We want your business to engage with customers and have them look to you as a trusted source for solutions. By creating unique marketing opportunities that capture the attention of consumers you encourage them to learn more about your business.

If you’ve missed these, or any of our posts, here is April’s blog rewind.

For the last two weeks, we’ve shared ten different ways that you can advertise your brand on the WickedLocal.com network. The types of advertising have been diverse in size and how they feature your content; each one designed to connect with one of our 2.8 million viewers in their own unique way. However, they are not the only ways available to engage with consumers through our 160 hyperlocal news sites. Here are five additional types of digital advertising opportunities Wicked Local offers.

The key to a great email marketing campaign is to create value for your customers. What makes your service, promotion, or product desireable? How can new and returning consumers use it to make their lives easier? These are the questions to ask yourself when developing a communication strategy. But, value isn’t necessarily sharing a link to a great coupon. Value to a consumer is created through creative and directed storytelling. You must provide them with a reason to visit your business. Your business’s value is not built on the products you offer, but how they are presented to customers.

Live events are designed to help direct consumers to the businesses they want to meet with. When you’re at an event, next to dozens of other businesses, you need something that will draw the attention of consumers to you, and create a buzz about your business.

At the beginning of the year, I wrote that streaming video would be the mostpopular trend in 2016. This prediction was based just on how many people used thePeriscope and Meerkat smartphone apps in 2015. On Wednesday, April 6th, Facebook, announced they would be launching their updated streaming video service “Facebook Live” to all users. In one day, Facebook created the largest streaming video network on the planet, and made it easier for you to promote your small business to everyone on social media.

Custom content is unlike other types of advertising, because the copy is written by you, the business owner, and doesn’t leave the marketing message up to interpretation. It’s content that you use to build anticipation for a promotion or to raise awareness regarding news in your industry. Your words can add a level of experience and authority that an ad may not convey.

Each year, millions of dollars are raised by participants who run the Boston Marathon to help raise awareness for organizations and specific causes. It’s an event that captures the attention and compassion of all residents of the Commonwealth and here are five ways your business can give to runners and their charities.

Search engine marketing (SEM) campaigns have proven to be a successful way for businesses to engage with consumers after they’ve completed a specific web search. With so many businesses already advertising on search engines, and utilizing keywords that you want to use, your business can have a hard time standing out. When building a SEM strategy, your goal should be to find keywords that will be most likely used during a web search and give you the best value possible when bidding for ad placement. Here are 4 tips to help you find the best keywords for your SEM campaign.

Last week, I wrote about the importance of having your businessproperly listed on business listing websites. These sites help increase your business’s digital footprint and strengthen your website’s search engine optimization (SEO). Because of Google’s global popularity, updating your Google Business page should be a top priority to provide consumers with updated contact and business information. If you haven’t claimed your Google business listing yet, here’s a step-by-step guide on how to do so.

As technology has evolved, so has the way businesses advertise and communicate with consumers. One thing that has not changed is that every business depends on word-of-mouth marketing. Nothing is more critical to the success of a business than getting customers to recommend it to their peers. As helpful as social media and business listing sites can be to promote your business, they also offer a way for disgruntled customers to share negative comments. Here are four ways you can respond to messages and improve your online reputation.